I've already mentioned in a previous
Editorial that the elderly are being overlooked in our government's
lockdown measures to try and stop the coronavirus.

I did submit various questions on this
subject to be asked at the regular Press Briefings the government
have been giving, but none were asked.

Instead, we got a three man verbal
assurance at the beginning of the briefing heralding how they all
champion the elderly here.

It was heartwarming to hear.

It was actually disheartening that
nothing at all was given to lessen the isolation the elderly already
had before the the lockdown.

In desperation I asked one of our MLA's
to ask the premier to open up at least some areas of the beaches
where the elderly could go to and get out of the prisons that they
are subjected to. He said he would.

We have published today an article
“COVID-19 targets the elderly. Why don’t our prevention
efforts?”. The article was written byDavid Wallace-Wells and first
published on the New York Mag website.

The writer is absolutely right. He
pointedly says,”... one observation from the early days of the
pandemic has been confirmed again and again, in country after
country: The lethality of the virus rises sharply with age. In the
United States, we have spent much of the last few months enacting and
debating uniform, universal public-health measures, which treat each
citizen equally for the purposes of applied policy: social-distancing
measures; “stay at home” or “shelter in place” guidelines;
modified guidelines for essential workers, all 50 million of them;
possible testing regimes, including “test, trace, and isolate”;
and now a gradual reopening of those measures, typically state by
state. Our policy, by and large, has treated every person as equally
at risk, but the disease doesn’t treat us all equally. “

Premier Alden McLaughlin alarmingly
stated that some of his callers, and he singled out the legal
profession, said something like 'the elderly have had their time and
its our time now - open up'.

He rightly condemned this with anger in
his voice.

These extreme views saying forget the
elderly is not just here. Wallace-Wells goes on to quote various
American leaders and media hosts with the same notion, “Texas
lieutenant governor Dan Patrick suggested that plenty of grandparents
would happily die to preserve the health of the American economy for
the children and grandchildren, later doubling down on the point to
suggest “there are more important things than living.”'

The advice given out by community and
health leaders everywhere is “stay at home” and “wash your
hands”. If they even remember there are elderly or vulnerable
persons is, “If you are over 65 and/or have a preexisting
condition, you should be more vigilant.”

I leave you with another quote from the
article, “....these guidelines are like abstinence-only sex
education: It doesn’t give you anything like the information you
need to actually succeed at managing your own risk, in part because
it’s one-size-fits-all and in part because that size simply won’t
fit everybody — or perhaps anybody — in the long run.”

It doesn't matter. Nothing is going to
change. The Elderly still don't count.

I am elderly. My wife is elderly. And
WE DO COUNT!!! EVERYONE OF US COUNTS!!!